Sithlord of the Sithling and best customer of McLovecraft's , in the business of keeping the little Platypus in businessModerations in GREEN and signed by the DAMNed. I am not anonymous! Also, MODSMACK!! Winner of the... 2010 Kilopost FRANKIE; 2010 Mad March Nom Off; 2010 Joker Cleavage Contest; 2010 Fan-Thing Contest; 2010 Mimic Contest (tied); 2011 Joker Cleavage Contest; 2011 Contest-for-the-next-Contest (tied)

Well, that'll teach Ruby to trust Dillon to be helpful with her confidences. I suppose that the one thing to be said for him is that he'd picked up on the degree of Ruby's inexperience despite her not finishing the sentence the one time she tried to say anything. Not difficult, really, but one wonders if Amber has managed that much yet.

The other irony is that, under other circumstances, Ruby would surely have been very interested in Dillon's description. Anyhow, given her exit now leaving her worries unrelieved, I think that there's a good chance that we'll see her getting advice from the yaoi club. Probably not good advice, mind.

And as previously, the lack of nudity - or for that matter verbal explicitness - doesn't stop the comic from being admirably uninhibited and open about sex.

Ruby could certainly do a lot worse than ask her. Judging by things like her previous advice to Yuki over Gary, she's not a deep thinker on such subjects, but at least she's not an idiot drama queen.* The trouble is, Ruby may now have been put off asking anybody. Which, by the laws of comedy, would mean that she ends up getting advice from everybody.

Anyhow, I'm now taking bets with myself on how strip #300 will echo #151.

*Honestly, "Oooo, that's really big" from Mr Sex On Every First Date?** There's no explanation or justification for Dillon's dialogue here beyond his urge to turn everything into a big production number.

**Of course, Dillon would deny having sex on every first date. It's just that every first date he's ever been on has ended in sex.

By the way, Ambra seems to be maybe the only character with some rationality. Moreover, she cares for her little sister and I think she would try to be helpful. Of course, I cannot imagine Ruby asking for help from her sister...

Most of these characters have some degree of rationality. It just tends to be unevenly distributed round different parts of their brains.

And Amber ... isn't actually stupid, though it seems that Ruby contrives to make her feel that way, but she's got rather a narrow view of life and a shortage of curiosity. She just doesn't get Ruby (who never tries to make it easier for her), and even if she came up with the right answer in this situation, they just couldn't communicate well enough for it to help.

In practice, of course, Amber's answer would pretty well certainly involve telling Ruby to have sex with Andy (on the grounds that it's likely to be good in the end, and she'll soon forget any physical or emotional discomfort). Which might well be the right answer, but is also the answer that Ruby would expect - so Ruby would just discount it.

Zii, on the other hand, would probably say that having sex was probably the right answer, but also has a fairly strong principle that people should do what they feel is right for them; I think she'd tell Ruby that it had to be her own free choice. If it is, it'll almost certainly feel good; if it isn't, yes, it'll be uncomfortable, one way or another. (Though if Andy is the guy in the lifesaver photo, what is Ruby waiting for?)

Which kind of thinking will certainly lead to Ruby going to bed with Andy in the end, because if she didn't actually want to, she wouldn't be stressing out like this. Let's face it, the Ruby of strip #10 wouldn't be worrying; she'd yell at Andy that he was a pig, and go home.

Spidrift wrote:Ruby could certainly do a lot worse than ask her. Judging by things like her previous advice to Yuki over Gary, she's not a deep thinker on such subjects, but at least she's not an idiot drama queen.* The trouble is, Ruby may now have been put off asking anybody. Which, by the laws of comedy, would mean that she ends up getting advice from everybody.

Anyhow, I'm now taking bets with myself on how strip #300 will echo #151

Are we sure they're doing that with SDB? #1 isn't echoed in #150.

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Yes it is, but subtly and mostly verbally. In #1, we see Dillon in a seemingly passionate embrace, and Amber murmurs "Dilly... never change." In #150, Dillon's embrace is asexual, and Ruby thinks "Something's gotta change here."

It's not as obvious as the bookend echoes in Ma3, but it's very dramatically appropriate; volume 1 is largely about Dillon slowly discovering that he has to change, and about him making a friend of Ruby, who'll try and help with that, whereas Amber just enables his bad habits.

So may just get a verbal echo in #300, too - but I think we might get more than that. #151 was about the adolescent repression that Dillon escaped, and about Ruby's sexual nature beginning to emerge despite herself; on present form, I think that we might see that Ruby has escaped her own repression in #300 - enough for her to be in bed with a guy again, but with that guy looking a whole lot happier than Dillon in #151.

Or perhaps we'll just see Amber getting so kinky with Ray that he complains he's unable to breathe.

Milnoc wrote:Zii? Helpful? I guess it would depend on her mood at the time.

Zii might want to live vicariously through someone else. Perhaps her heterosexual first time was nothing spectacular so she can help put Ruby's mind at ease. She might convince her to be the businesswoman in the bedroom by negotiating what she wants from Andy. That's speaking her language.

Oh God, that last is one innocent possibility that none of us here had thought of. I can just imagine it; Ruby psychs herself up; Andy takes her home, then leaves her in the lounge for a moment; Ruby takes a deep breath and strips down to a set of new white lace underwear; Andy comes back into the room with his mother...

The best Ruby could hope for then would be Andy's mother smiling sweetly and saying "I'll leave you two together". Which would be embarrassment enough for Ruby.

christopheftw wrote:Given the romantic and sexual experience level of these two, an eighth grade step up in level might be more appropriate, even though they are adults.

Be fair; Ruby may be inexperienced, but she tries to see the world through an adult lens. That's why she's interpreting "the next level" as "sex" here. Andy, I'm not so sure about; he may well mean something innocent.

Actually, given Ruby's tendency to do the reading before attempting anything, I think that when they do go to bed, she may well have a much better idea what she's doing, in theory, than he does. Which could either be deeply weird or make Andy a very lucky man, depending how well Ruby can apply the theory.